
g 



MR. WHIPPLE S 



I) ISCOURSE 



1 HE LI F E A N I) S E 1! V 1 < ' 1. S 



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DANIEL WEBSTER 



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Rook iA/<fW& 



DISCOURSE 



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COMJI E M ( ) i; A II ( ) X ( ) V T 1 1 K I. I V V. AND - I". U V I ( I. > 



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D A N I E L AY E E> S T E R 



DELIVERED BEFORE THE CITIZENS OF PROVIDENCE, 



NpvEMB 1:1:. 23^.1.9.5 3. ;•••..■ 



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u y J o-ii^n W -i'i 7 i ; p : tVt:', 'f.'f .'.' I » 



PROVIDENCE: 

l. n w I. ES, A N I II OS J & CO PRINTERS 



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PRELIMINARY PROCEEDINGS 



Pursuant to notice previously published, a numerous and highly respectable 
meet'ni"' of the citizens of Providence was held at Mechanics Hall, on Thursdaj 
November 4th. Hon. John Pitman of the United States District Court 
was called to the Chair, and Amos ]). Smith. Esq. was appointed Secre- 
tary. After some brief and impressive remarks by the Chairman, the follow- 
ing Resolutions were offered by the Rev. Dr. C \-w Eix,upon which the meet- 
ine was addressed by Hon. Albert C. Greene, Thomas F. Carpenti r, 
Esq. Rev. Dr. Hall, President WaYland, and Hun. A. C. Barstow, 
Mayor of the city. 

Resolved, That the death of Daniel Webster, which occurred on the morn- 
be of the 24th of October last, at his residence in Marshfield, Mass., is an event 
which awakens the unaffected sorrow and merits the gravest consideration of 
the American people. 

Resolved, 'That while we bow with submission to the dispensation of Divine 
Providence, which removed him from this life in the full possession of his great 
powers and while discharging with honor to his country many of the most im- 
portant administrative duties of the government, it becomes us to cherish his 
memory as a part of our truest national glory and to do what we can to trans- 
mit to those who come after us, our high appreciation of his long and varied 
and preeminent public services. 

Resolved, That as a scholar and writer, thoroughly master of the English 
tongue, and inculcating in the immortal productions of his pen, sentiments of 
the Loftiest patriotism, the purest Christian morality and the reverence of all 
things sacred ; a- an orator endowed with the raresl powers of forensic and 
parliamentary eloquence, always directed to worthy ends: as a jurist and 
-man of far-reaching and consummate ability; and more than all. as the 
■! expounder and defender of the Constitution of these United States, by 
which our dearest rights ami privileges are made secure, and social harmony 
established throughout our wide domain, he justly claims of every American 
eiti/.en the most prof mud respect and admiration. 

Resolved, That a Committee of eight beappointedby this meeting to make 
arrangement- tor the early delivery of a public discourse commemorative of 
the life and services of Daniel Webster. 



JOHN WHIPPLE, Esq. 

1m u: Sib :-- The undersigned embrace the earliest opportunity to 
present to you their sincere thanks for the eloquent and very appropriate 
discourse pronounced by yen this day, in commemoration of the character 
and sen ices of Daniel W'i bs i i a. 

1 '. :lie\ ing that it will be read with interest, and thai its circulation will con- 
duce to the public good, they respectfully request on behalf of their fellow 
citizens as well as themselves, a copy for publication. 

ALEXIS CASWELL, 
JOHN PITMAN, 
AMos D. SMITH, 
ALBERT ('. GREENE, 
THO'S. F. CARPENTER, 
MOSES B. IVES, 
WILLIAM W. IlolTIX. 
(I. W. HALLET. 
Prooidi nr, , y,,r. 23, 1 852. 



of 
Arrangemt nts. 



1'i:m\ mm \« i . NOV] MB! i: 23, 1 852. 

Gentlemen: — [return you my sincere thanks for the flattering estimate 
von have expressed of the discourse I had the honor of delivering to-day in 
commemoration of the character and services of 1 > \mi l W'i bster, and in 
accordance with your wishes, 1 submil it to your disposal. 
Most respectfullj . j ours, 



Mess 



Alexis Caswell, 
, I.ni\ Pitman, 
Amos 1 >. Smi i a, 
A. C. Greene, 

THO'S. F. < V.RP1 n 1 1 i:. 

Mosi - 1!. Ives, 
\Y \i W. I [oppin, 

( i. W. Hum i . 



t 'omtnitU ' 

. irrniii/i mi nts. 



John wiurri.K 



DISCOURSE. 



My Friends and Fellow Citizens: 

It is good for us that we arc here. It is of good and 
for good, that we come up to this temple of religious 
worship to mingle our spirit with the spirit of him, 
whose loss we so deeply deplore ; of him whose whole 
life exhibited in an eminent degree the two grand prin- 
ciples of human action, which above all other principles 
elevate and ennoble our nature ; the worship of the God 
whom he adored, and the service of the country he 
loved. These were as prominent elements of his life, 
as earth and air and ocean, are prominent elements of 
the globe we inhabit. 

Reason and a deep consciousness of future responsi- 
bility were not bestowed upon us without an object. It 
is true that for some wise purpose beyond our power to 
comprehend, God has bestowed upon man every degree 
of physical power ; from the broad and compact frame of 
the giant, down almost to the helpless weakness of the 
infant ; every measure of intellectual light and strength. 
from the effulgent mind of Bacon, down to the almost 
total darkness of the idiot. But he has bestowed upon 
all a deep and abiding sense of responsibility somewhere 
and somehow, which we can no more escape from than 
from the shadows of our bodies in the sunlight of hea- 
ven. There they cast themselves upon the earth we 



inhabit, and follow us as conscience follows our spirit, 
until the darkness of the tomb envi Lopes us. The body 
will decay and its shadow be no more. But the spirit 
is not of earth, and earth cannot destroy it. Hence the 
universal consciousness among all nations, ancient and 
modern, of a state of future responsibility. 

Mr. Webster died as he had lived, calm, dignified and 
self-possessed. Like the Roman senator he folded his 
robes around him and met the king irrors with the 

dignity of a man. and the humility of a Christian. 

The most prominent events in the lite of this gr 
man are already before the public. Reminiscences from 
the pen of Mr. March, and at a later period his biogra- 
phy by Mr. Edward Everett, have done full and ample 
justice to their subject. His speeches and other great 
forts in the cause of human freedom and the advance- 
ment of human civilization, are also published. All who 
feel an interest in the characters and services of the great 
statesmen of modern days, have probably read his works, 
and are familiar witli the prominent features of hi-* char- 
acter. In the short period usually allowed to occasions 
like the present, it will be impossible for me to present to 
you tin' whole of Daniel Webster. 1 can only furnish 
specimens here and there of his great mind and his great 
deeds. One or two outpourings from -Etna or Vesu- 
vius will give some idea of the tires within their capa- 
cious bosoms. 

Mr. Webster, it seems was born on the l s th of Janu- 
ary, 1782, three months after young Hamilton and his 
three intrepid followers were the first to scale the walls 
ofYorktown. He first saw the light of heaven reflected 
from the snow drifts of a cold and mountain country. 
lie was born on the very outside of civilization, on the 



borders of a forest nearly two hundred miles in extent, 
inhabited by ferocious savages. He was the second son 
of Ebenezer Webster and Abigail Eastman, a second 
wife. "Ebenezer, the father," says the biographer, " is 
still recollected in Kingston and Salisbury. 1 1 is per- 
sonal appearance was striking. He was erect, of athletic 
stature, six feet high, broad and full in the chest. Long 
service in the war had given him a military air and car- 
riage. He belonged to the intrepid border race which 
lined the whole frontier of the Anglo- American colonies, 
by turns farmers, huntsmen, and soldiers, and passing 
their lives in one long struggle with the hardships of an 
infant settlement, on the skirts of a primeval forest." 

" Ebenezer "Webster enlisted early in life as a common 
soldier in one of those formidable companies of Bangers 
which rendered such important services under Sir Jeffrey 
Amherst and Wolfe, in the Seven Years War. lie fol- 
lowed the former distinguished leader in tin 1 invasion of 
Canada, attracted the attention and gained the good will 
of his superior officers, by his brave and faithful conduct, 
and rose to the rank of a captain before the end of the 
war." 

After the peace of 1763, Captain Webster and other 
retired officers and soldiers obtained a grant from the 
principal grantee of the town of Salisbury. Captain 
Webster received his allotment in its northerly portion. 
He cut his way deeper into the wilderness than other-. 
and made the path he could not find. At this time his 
nearest civilized neighbors on the northwest, were at 
Montreal. 

It is further stated in the touching biographical sketch 
that the mother of Daniel Webster, "like tin 1 mothers 
of so manv men of eminence, was a woman of more than 



8 

ordinary intellect, and possessed a force of character 
which was felt throughout the humble circle in which 
she moved. She was proud of her sons and ambitious 
that they should excel. Her anticipations went beyond 
the narrow sphere in which their lot seemed to be cast, 
and the distinction attained by both, and especially by 
the younger, may well be traced in part to her early 
promptings and judicious guidance." 

•' In the war of our Revolution it seems that like so 
many of the officers and soldiers of the former war, his 
father obeyed the first call to arms in the new strueerle. 
lie commanded a company chiefly composed of his own 
townspeople, friends and kindred, who followed him dur- 
ing the greater portion of the war. lie was at the bat- 
tle of White Plains, and was at West Point when the 
treason of Arnold Mas discovered, lie acted as Major 
under Stark at Bennington, and contributed his share 
to the success of that eventful day." 



If I have oyer been fervently Impressed with the pow- 
er of God, if I have ever had a deep and overwhelming 
religious feeling, or a heartfelt conviction of the mere 
dust that we are, it has arisen from a survey of His su- 
pendous works. Ever since I [e .said. " let there he light, 
and there was light" — ever since He spread out the vast 
and, to our feeble minds, illimitable expanse of suns and 
moons and planets, placed al distances and moving with 
velocities which the strongest imaginations are unable 
to form a conception of. has there existed in the human 
mind a deep religions feeling. Somewhat akin to this 
is that next great feeling, the love of country. Jt is 
breathed into us. often in our infancy, 1>\ the scenery 
around ns. full of sublimity, and by the lofty minds we 



9 

daily commune with, all glowing with intense and burn- 
ing patriotism. The father of Daniel Webster was not 
simply Ebenezer Webster, a farmer of New Hampshire, 
but Ensign Webster, Captain Webster, and then Major 
Webster, one of the heroes of two wars, fighting the 
battles of his country, and in every battle, whether with 
the savages of the forest, the Canadian French, or later, 
against veteran British troops, always in the front rank 
of his little band of Spartan heroes. His stature was 
majestic, and his heart corresponded with his stature. 

The grandeur of the scenery which encircled the infan- 
cy of young Webster, the lofty mountain chain beneath 
the shade of which he passed his early days, its foaming 
torrent streams, the Alpine snow-drifts, and the solemn 
eloquence of the dense and uninhabited forest, were not 
lost upon him. There existed another circumstance, 
probably stronger than most men in these clays of peace 
and security will at once allow. Most of the officers and 
soldiers of the Revolution were young men, from eigh- 
teen to twenty-fh •. When peace was established in 
1783, they returned to their homes, still in middle life. 
Mr. Webster himself informs us that New Hampshire 
enlisted more men than any other State in the Union. 
and that there was not a battle fought, from Lexington 
to Yorktown, in which New Hampshire blood was not 
spilled. Of the three hundred and twenty thousand 
troops enlisted during the revolutionary war, more than 
one half were from New England. We all of us know 
the loftiness, the devotedness, the intense love of country 
which these patriotic soldiers evinced during their . - 
maining lives. War songs, recounting their deeds of 
heroism, and recounting their sufferings, were almost 
!v suns in every loir cabin and farm house in New 



10 

Hampshire. It requires, therefore, but a little of the 
license allowed the poet to say, that while young TV 
was rocked to sleep by a mother's hand, he listened to 
patriotic songs from a mother's lips. His infancy and 
his youth were passed amid the same inspiring influ- 
ences. Can we fail to see in this the seeds of an intense 
national feeling early implanted and gradually spread- 

; over his whole character I He became ambitious 
to serve his country. But long years of peace ensued. 
All prospect of military fame had terminated. He 
therefore longed for an education that he might i 
tinguish himself in some other way. But his father had 
a large family to support, and his heart forbade his mak- 
known his ardent desire for intellectual culture. At 
a subsequent period, when returning home in a slei 
his father communicated to him his intention of sending 
him to college for an education. The heart of young 
Webster was so full that he could not speak. "He leaned 
his head upon his father's arm and wept.'" This is the 
stuff that patriots are made of. It tells its own story. 

lie was then fifteen years old. Pie prepared for col- 
lege, and entered Dartmouth in }'i'-J~i. During the va- 

ions he taught a school in order to pay the expense 
of his brother's education. But Mr. Ticknor ii 
us, ' ; that while in college he was already in the estima- 
tion of those who knew him, a marked man, and t" 
to tlie mo S[acious of them the lienors of his sul 

quenl career have net been unexpi 

aduated in 1801, and entered the* of Mr. 

Thompson, a neighbor of his father, as a student of law. 
Mr. March informs us that he remained in the o "un- 

til he felt it necessan » somewhere and earn a little 

> 

money." lie took charge of an academy at Fryeburg, 



11 

iii Maine, upon a salary of one dollar per day, and acted 
as assistant to the Register of Deeds for the county. In 
this way he saved a fund for his own professional educa- 
tion and to help his brother through college. 

In 1804 he entered the office of Christopher Gore in 
Boston, where he pursued his legal and other studies 
with diligence and ardor. In the spring of 1805 he was 
admitted to the practice of the law in the Court of Com- 
mon Pleas for Suffolk county. Mr. Gore, in recommend- 
ing him, says Mr. Everett, " dwelt with emphasis on the re- 
markable attainments and uncommon promise of his pu- 
pil, and closed with a prediction of his future eminence." 

Mr. Webster opened an office at Boscawen, near his 
father's residence. His father, who had been appointed 
Judge of the Court of Common Pleas, died within a year 
after he commenced his practice. 

In 1807, Mr. Webster was admitted as an attorney and 
counsellor of the Supreme Court of Xew Hampshire, 
and removed to Portsmouth, where he remained in the 
practice of his profession for nine successive years. Dur- 
ing this period he was often associated with Samuel Dex- 
ter, Joseph Story, and Jeremiah Mason, and often op- 
posed to them. 

In the month of November, 1812, he was elected a 
Representative to the Congress of the United States, and 
took his seat at the first session of the thirteenth Con- 
gress, which was an extra session, called in May, 1813. 

I [enry Clay was then Speaker of the House. Calhoun, 
Lowndes, Pickering, and Gaston were among its leading 
members. In the organization of the House, Mr. Web- 
ster was placed by the Speaker upon the Committee of 
Foreign Affairs, a select committee at that time, and ne- 
cessarily in time of war the most important one. 



12 

rly in tli: ion he iries of resolutions 

live to the repeal of th rlin and Milan deer* 

and on the 10th of J lie delivered his maiden 

speech upon th' -oiuti< 

Mr. Everett inforn that '-it was marked by all the 

of Mr. Webster's maturest parliamentary 

ion of t . . recision of statement, force 

of reasoning, ambitiou . toric and hi 

flown Ian . occasional bursts of true eloquence, and, 

pervading the whole, i 

Mr. .V a still more glowing account of this 

first parliamentary ( .. irt. 

Chief Justice - all, a cooler head, in writing to a 

friend, remarks. " I did not then hesitate to state that - 
"Webster very able man, and would become one of 

the first statesmen in America, and perhaps the very 
firs 

Mr. V tr had now fairly launched his bark upon 

the great ocean of public life. He commenced with the 
stars and stripes streaming aloft, and he never lowered 
them to foreign force or foreign . ; he never 

dimmed Their bright and vivid coloring during the whole 
period of his public servi It must be remembered 

that he was 1 nit thirty-one of age, and that much 

the mature part of his life had been employed in 'his 
labors at the bar. It must also be remembered that he 

3 opposed to most of the measures of the 
ministration. Yet in his ii in 1814 he uses the 

following lai showing that his country and not 

his party reigned supreme in his mind: "Give up your 

lie projects of in V! Extinguish the fires which 

blaze on your inland frontiers. Unclench the iron grasp 
tr em "With all the war of the enem\ 



13 

your commerce, you would still have some commerce 
left, if you would cease to make war upon it yourseh 3, 
That commerce would give you some revenue ; apply 
that revenue to the augmentation of your navy. That 
navy will in turn protect your commerce. Let it no 
longer be said that not one ship of the four built by your 
hands since the war, yet floats upon the ocean. There 
the united wishes and exertions of the nation will go 
with you. Even our party divisions, acrimonious as they 
are, cease at the water's edge." 

This and other similar efforts gained for him the rep- 
utation indicated by the well known remark of Mr. 
Lowndes, of South Carolina, "that the North had not his 
equal, nor the South his superior." u It must be remem- 
bered too, 1 ' observes his biographer, " that these views 
were announced a considerable time before Hull, Bain- 
bridge, and Decatur, had broken the spell of British na- 
val supremacy." 

In August, 1814, Mr. Webster was re-elected to 
Congress. At the close of the first session, in August, 
1816, he removed to Boston, and for several years de- 
voted himself exclusively to his profession. During 
this period he was employed in most of the important 
es in Massachusetts, and many in other States, and 
by his masterly logic and commanding eloquence estab- 
lished a reputation in his own and in our mother coun- 
try, if not unequalled, certainly not surpassed by any of 
his contemporary 

In the autumn of 1822, -Mr. Webster was elected a 
member of Congress from the city of Boston, for the 
sion which commenced in December 1823. This elec- 
tion was after repeated refusals on the part of Mr. 
Webster. In complying with the earnest and anxious 



14 

desire of the great majority of the citizens of Boston, 
he felt that he was making Larger sacrifices of duty to 
his family than the peaceful condition of national affair 8 
required. Mr. Ei informs us " that he was at last 

called upon in a manner, which seemed to him impera- 
tive, to make the great sacrifice/' Few men. here or 
elsewhere, have made so great a pecuniary sacrifice. He 
was at the time at the very head of his profession. It 
was a period when the dockets of the courts were filled 
with cases involving large questions and large anion: 
and Mr. Webster himself must have felt that a consider- 
able portion of the amount in dispute Mould, as is gen- 
erally the case, find its way into professional pock' 

Perhaps I may not improperly here introduce what 
may possibly he useful to tin 1 rising generation, the little 
I know of Mr Webster's system of mental culture. 

[had directions from a client, in 1818 or 1819, to 
consult him in a case of some importance, a case in which 
were presented numerous and cross questions of law 
and equity, so ensnarled and entangled, that it required 
days and weeks of hard labor to discover a channel way 
over its shoals, and amid its rocks. I called on Mr. 
Webster on the evening of my arrival in JmMou and 
stated the nature 1 of the case. He saw its difficulties 
and observed that the early morning was the period for 
such a labor, and requested me to meet him in his study 
nt an early hour, which I accordingly did. Before the 
hour of dinner, he laid threaded all the avenues and 
cross | of the labyrinth, and he gave an opinion so 

clear and so comprehensive, that at the dinner table 1 
was induced to ask him what had been his system of 

mental culture. He gave me an outline and the reasons 

in support of it. It was this ; that SO tar as training 



15 

concerned, the system which experience has shown to be 
most conducive to physical, is equally conducive to 
mental power. That the training in both cases should 
be the same, that it is a law of our natures, that the 
body or the mind that labors constantly, must nee 
sarily labor moderately. He instanced the race horse, 
which by occasional efforts, in which all its power is ex- 
erted, followed by periods of entire rest, would in time 
add very largely to its speed ; and the great walkers or 
runners of our own race, who from small beginnings, 
when fifteen or twenty miles a day fatigue them, would 
in the end, walk off fifty miles at the rate of five or six 
miles an hour. I think that he also mentioned the Lon- 
don porter, who at first staggering under a load of one 
hundred and fifty or two hundred pounds, would in time 
carry six or eight hundred pounds with apparent ease. 
The same law governs the mind. When employed at 
all, all its powers should be exerted to its utmost. 
Its fatigue should be followed by its entire rest. Ik- 
stated that he was generally in his study at five in the 
morning, that whatever mental occupation employed him, 
he put forth all his power, and when his mental vision 
an to be obscure, he ceased entirely and resorted to 
some amusement or light business, as a relaxation. I 
remember distinctly his quotation from Chesterfield ; 
"do one thing at a time, and whatever is worth doing 
at all is worth doing well." 

I cannot remember the language but these were his 
general views. His views of mental culture led me to 
some thought and reflection which ended in the entire con- 
viction, that the great object in view is mental power and 
not mental acquisition alone. The greatest readers ai 
seldom the most profound thinkers. The mechanics 



16 



with the greatest variety of tools arc not always the be6t 
workmen. Books. Bacon obsi . are but helps to 
the mind. Eloquence such as Hamilton's. Henry's, 
Dexter's and Webster's, or Shakspeare's and Demosthe- 
nes', rar< ly proceeds from men of great learning. It 
is intense thinking, the slow and painful process of e - 
cehtrating all the powers upon a given subject, that 1 
at the foundation of eloquence. Mr. Webster was an 
eminent instance. I was in Washington during the de- 
bate in the Senate principally by Hayne and "Webster. 
but my professional engagements deprived me of the 
pleasure of listening to it. After the delivery of I 

:ch of Mr. "Webster, many if not all the members at 
our table, among many other laudatory remai >m- 

mended it for the novelty of its views of the Constitu- 
tion. When I came to the reading of the prinl 

h I recognized what I had seen or heard before, 
and finally traced the source of these impressions back 
to Mr. Webster himself. In a long walk on Ivlio; - 
[sland, in the year 1822, he propounded to me for my 
opinion, a number of supposed < f conflict between 

the General and the State Governments. I replied that 
they were questions of entire novelty which I had never 
thought i He went on to give his views which he did 
somewhat at lai From that day up to the reading of 

his greal argument, I had no; bestowed a thought upon 
them. The first opportunity 1 had. 1 as I Mr. Web- 
if he recollected our walk upon Rhode [sland. He 
i ctly well, and he also said that he had occu- 
pied a large portion i his h isure bonis upon the Con- 
ation e|" tlic I and that probably no 
question could well arise between the power of the 
States and thai of tin- United States, which he was not 



as ready to discuss as he ever could be. Mr. Justice 
Story, to whom I mentioned the circumstance, also sta- 
ted that to his certain knowledge, Mr. Webster required 
little or no preparation for questions of that character ; 
that he had thought deeply and intensely on the sub- 
ject for years, and was therefore prepared at any time 
and upon any occasion. 

I may also add as an illustration of the elevation of 
his character, that I have often been associated with Mr. 
Webster and have often been opposed to him before the 
judicial tribunals of the country, that I have heard his 
arguments in the Supreme Court of the United States, in 
most of the great cases in which he was concerned as 
counsel ; that I was also in his confidence in some po- 
litical movements of great delicacy, and have often con- 
versed with him in relation to the character and con- 
duct of the leading men of the opposite party, as well 
as of his own political rivals, and that from the begin- 
ning to the end of my acquaintance with him, I never 
heard him speak disparagingly of any one of these gen- 
tlemen nor of any other human being. 

I have stated that Mr. Webster had consented to com- 
plv with the wishes of the people of Boston, and that 
he had been elected as their Representative to the Con- 
gress of 1823. His biographer, Mr. Everett, the sincere 
and highly gifted friend of Mr. Webster states, " it was 
the main inducement of Mr. Webster in returning to po- 
litical life, that the cessation of the coarse conflict of 
party warfare seemed to hold out some hope, that 
statesmanship of a higher order, an impartial study of 
the great interests of the country, and a policy aiming 
to promote the development of its vast natural resources 
might be called into action." 



this period it will be remembered that Mr. Monroe 
>e President of - I that party 

politics which had lost 

the wise and impartial administration of Mr. Madison, 
had almost s I to exist under the admii ^on of 

successor, James Monroe. 
Europe, however, was in a convulsive and agitated 
state. Revolutions had broken out in Naples, in Pied- 
mont, and in Spain, while a fierce war w; ing in 
Greece between the Turk and the Greek. Mr. Monroe 
had in his messages, the two previous session-, c lied 
ttention of Congress to this subject, but no action 
of either House had been had upon it. In the beginning 
of the on, Mr. Webster submitted to the House of 
Representatives, the following resolution: 

Resolved, That provision ought to be made by law, tor defraying 
the es incident to the appointment of an Agent or i 

sioner to Greece, whenever the President shall di dient to 

make such appointment. 

This resolution was supported by a masterly speech 
from Mr. Webster. It evinces in the cleai s 
irnest that all other nations might 

1 to them the civil and political freedom, I less- 

of which we had so fully enjoyed. Hi- 
crowded house, on the 19th of .hum 
Th< citation which had b iquired 

hes in the- Ho;; 
■ ears I . usurpassed i at the 

• in t" l na- 

tional characti . trly hour. Mr. 

v ju8 of this . •• it v re- 

markable for what it did not, ■ what it did say." 

His heart was animated with tin- the most earnest wish 



19 

and the ardent hope, that something- might be done for 
the down trodden Greek. His exordium is filled with a 
power and beauty which Webster and Webster all 
could at any time command. 

"An occasion," he says, "which calls the attention to a 
spot so distinguished, so connected with interesting 
collections, as Gre< ce, may naturally create something of 
L-mth and enthusiasm. In a grave political discus- 
sion, however, it is necessary that those feelings should 
be chastised. I shall endeavor properly to repress them, 
though it is impossible that they should be altogether 
extinguished. We must indeed fly behind the civilized 
world. We must pass the dominion of law and the 
boundaries of knowledge. We must, more especially, 
withdraw ourselves from this place, and the scenes and 
objects which here surround us, if we would separate 
ourselves entirely from the influence of those memorials 
of herself which ancient Greece has transmitted, for the 
admiration and benefit of mankind." 

In allusion to the doctrines established by Russia, 
Prussia and Austria, at their holy and august meeting 
at Laybach, in 1821, he says, -now. sir, this principle 
would carry Europe back again, at once, into the mid- 
dle of the dark ages. It is the old doctrine of the divine 
right of kings advanced now by new advocates, and sus- 
ted by a formidable array of pow. . 

One of the extraordinary and most dangerous preten- 
sions advanced by this congress of crowned heads v. . 
their right distinctly asserted, to take a hostile attitude 
in regard to those States in which the overthrow ofth 
government may operate as an example. These a 
very words of this congress, and which Webster pro- 



20 

nounced to be a " most flagrant violation of public law 
and national independence." 

"No matter." he says, -what may be the character of 
the government resisted ; no matter with what weight 

the foot of the oppressor bears on the neck of the op- 
pressed ; if he struggles or if he complains, he sets a 
dangerous example of resistance, and from that moment 
he becomes an object of hostility to the most powerful 
potentates of the earth. I want words to express my 
abhorrence of this abominable principle." 

Mr. Webster pursues this strain of lofty eloquence in 
vindication of the rights of the people of every nation to 
govern themselves, at great length, and concludes this 
part of the subject with these emphatic words: 

" If the authority of all these governments be hereaf- 
ter to be mixed and blended, and to iiow in one augmen- 
ted current of prerogative over the face of Europe, 
sweeping away all resistance in its course, it will yet re- 
main for us to secure our own happiness by the preser- 
vation of our own principles; which I hope we shall 
have the manliness to express on all proper occasions 
and the spirit to defend in every extremity." 

His biographer informs us that '-his words of en- 
couragement were read in every capital, and at every 
Court in Europe, and in every continental language; 
they were received with grateful emotions in Greece." 

I have consumed more time upon this part of the 
public services of Mr. Webster, because 1 have had other 
means of knowing that the anient wish of his heart was, 
that our bright example might spread, from nation to 
nation, until the freedom of the people should extend 

over the whole civilized world. 



21 

His speech in April, 1826, in favor of the right of the 
Provinces of Spain in South America, is equally strong 
and eloquent in support of the right of the people to es- 
tablish such a government as their own wisdom might 
dictate. 

In the month of June, 1827, Mr. Webster was elected 
to the Senate of the United States by a large majority of 
the votes of the two Houses composing the legislature 
of Massachusetts. The Presidential term of General 
Jackson, it will be remembered, commenced on the 4th 
of March, 1829. It will also be remembered, that on 
the 29th of December, 1829, Mr. Foot of Connecticut, 
introduced a resolution in relation to the public lands in 
these words : 

Resolved, That the Committee on Puhlic Lands be instructed to en- 
quire and report the quantity of public lands remaining unsold within 
each State and Territory, and whether it be expedient to limit for a 
certain period the sales of the public lands to such lands only as have 
heretofore been offered for sale, and arc now subject to entry at the 
minimum price. And also whether the otHce of Surveyor General, 
and some of the land offices may not be abolished without detriment 
to the public interest. 

The consideration of the resolution was not resumed 
until the 13th day of January, when Mr. Benton of 
Missouri, spoke against it with his usual ability and with 
the full force of his characteristic severity. It must be 
remembered in connection with the present subject, that 
South Carolina was the State, whose Senators and Rep- 
resentatives in Congress in 1816 were among the ablest 
and most earnest supporters of the system of protection 
to the manufacturing industry of the country. No man 
lent more efficient aid to establish that system than did 
Mr. Calhoun. But for some years previous to 1830 a 
change had taken place in the minds of Southern men in 



ard to the effects of protective laws upon the great in- 
terests of the Sou: In order to obtain a re- 
peal of tho> 3, it was contended that they were not 
only injurious in the iral effect, but also that ti. 

'tional and void. This had become the 
general sentiment of 8011th Carolina, and had also been 
largely diffused through all the cotton growing States. It 
was also contended that the American Constitution 
not a constitution - d by the people of the United 

States, but a compact of the several States, and that con- 
sequently each State has a right to nullify that comp 
whenever in its opinion it has been violated by the gov- 
ernment of the United Si i This pretension embodied 

If in the general phrase, the doctrine of Nullification. 
South Carolina felt her inability to contend single hand- 
ed against the government of the United 3. It 
therefore became of vital importance to obtain the aid of 
other States in support of this new and extraordinary d - 
trine. The "Western States at that period were but thin- 
ly settled, and their obvious interest was to attract n 
settlers by very low prices for government lands. The 
resolution of Mr. Toot was ;i mere resolution of inquiry. 
But as it afforded an opportunity to the Representatii 
from South Carolina to create an ill feeling in the \\ 
against New England, and thus gain the aid of the West 
to their new theory of nullification, it w :ed upon 
with aviditv by Colonel Hayne, a Senator from South 
Carolina. Be resented the tariff laws 
having originated in New England, and as operating ben- 
eficially for New England and injuriously to all the other 
States. Mr. Benton caught the bait thrown out for the 
West, and on the 18th of January spoke at great length 
and with hi- usual bitterness against the resolution. 



23 

Other members took part in the debate, and Colonel 
Hayne occupied the rest of the day and the whole of the 
succeeding day. 

Up to this time Mr. Webster had taken no part in the 
debate, but had been occupied with the management of 
a case in the Supreme Court. He heard only the clos- 
ing-part of Colonel Hayne' s argument. 

It has been stated, that the speech of Colonel Hayne 
had made a deep impression on the public mind ; that the 
friends of nullification all over the city, were highly ela- 
ted and fully confident of a triumphant victory; while on 
the other hand, the friends of the constitution were de- 
jected and dispirited. There is some truth and some er- 
ror in this statement. It was not the argument of Colonel 
Hayne in favor of the constitutional right of a State to 
nullify a law of the United States, that caused those fears 
and apprehensions. The argument upon that question, 
notwithstanding the aid furnished him by Mr. Calhoun, 
required a depth and power of logic which Colonel Hayne 
did not possess. He entered the field clothed in the ar- 
mor of Achilles, but he wanted the power and skill of 
Achilles to use it. He was a gentleman and a scholar.with 
a flow of musical sentences, and a power of side thru 
well calculated to enlist the Wesl against Xcw England 
and indirectly in favor of nullification. It was evident 
that the minds of many had been powerfully impressed. 
The magnitude of the question alone created an intei 
anxiety. At no period, upon no occasion has there ever 
been in this country, or in any country, a spectacle 

ind and so novel, so full of d . and at I 

time so p illy conducted. It involved all the hi 

into . not only cut but future, of every man in 

the country. It involved the q our national 



24 

existence. It involved the question of the civil and so- 
cial freedom of the human race. History records no event 
in the world's great changes for three thousand years of 
such deep interest. Poetry has never raised its imagina- 
tion high enough to catch even a distant view of so sub- 
lime and magnificent a spectacle as was that trial of a 
nation's existence in the American Senate. 

The Representatives of the first great and free Repub- 
lic the world has ever known were there. Their hearts 
were filled with emotions of the loftiest patriotism. — 
Most of the minor feelings of party strife and political 
ambition fled from their bosoms as darkness flees before 
the sun-light of heaven. Representatives of all the for- 
ei<m Courts were there. Some of them had read Chat- 
ham, and listened perhaps to Pitt, to Pox. to Sheridan 
and Burke. They felt, and they expressed their feelings, 
that their blood ran in our veins. They felt, and felt 
deeply, that the great question of human civilization de- 
pended upon the union of these young and giant States, 
and that if our course continued onward we should draw 
all other civilized communities after us; that if we failed, 
mankind would be driven back to feudal darkness and op- 
pression. Many wen- there who had fought under Wash- 
ington, and into whose hearts he had breathed his own 
intense love of country. Men of science, and men of lit- 
erary eminence were there, and all this vast audience was 
"•raced bv a gallen of beauty, such as never before looked 
down upon the deliberations ofth Si Late. 

Such ^as the occasion, and such the audience. The 
presence of a hundred Kings, Saxon or Gallic, could have 
added nothing to its sublimity. The accumulated wealth 

of the Indies could have added nothing to its lustre. 



25 

The great and brilliant victory over the enemies of 
human freedom there achieved was the work of Daniel 
Webster alone. There were at that period around him, 
in Congress and out of Congress, many of the ablest 
men of the times, men intimately acquainted with the 
whole scope and all the bearings of the Constitution, 
men of great learning and great power. Had they deem- 
ed it necessary, they could have aided the great cause 
with a high order of eloquence and a profound pow- 
er of logic. Yet, as I was informed at the time, so 
great was their confidence in the vast resources of his un- 
surpassed, if not unequalled mind, that they did not fur- 
nish him with a single suggestion. They feared that they 
might dim his broader and clearer vision with their own 
lesser lights. They left him alone ; they left him to en- 
circle his brow with a crown of glory, which, from the 
days of the Mede and the Persian down to the present, 
has never encircled the brow of hero, or statesman, of 
emperor or king. From that period to the present, " if 
the Tartar and the Arab have not conversed about him 
in their tents," every American heart has " swelled with 
a just and noble pride, at the mention of his name." 

After this signal overthrow in her appeal to the wis- 
dom of our national rulers, South Carolina threatened 
an appeal to arms. At the close of 1832, the doctrine 
of nullification was recommended by a State Convention. 
" This decisive act," says Mr. Everett, ; ' aroused the hero 
of New-Orleans. Confidential orders to hold thcnisclws 
in readiness for active service were sent in every direction 
to the officers of the army and the navy. Prudent and 
resolute men were quietly stationed at the proper posts. 
Arms and munitions in abundance were held in rea- 
diness, and a chain of expresses in advance of the mails 



26 

was established from the Capital to Charleston. These 
preparations made, the Presidential proclamationof the 
11th of December, 183»2, was issued. It was writ- 
ten by Edward Livingston, then Secretary of State, 

from notes furnished bv General Jackson himself, but 
there was not an idea of importance in it which may not 
be found in Mr. Webster's speech on Mr. Foofs resolution. 

This was met by a counter proclamation of Governor 
Hayne, of South Carolina ; and on the 16th of January 
"a bill to provide for the collection of duties on imports," 
was introduced into the Senate upon the suggestion of 
the President. 

On the following day Mr. Calhoun introduced a series 
of resolutions in the Senate, affirming the power of a 
State to nullify an act of Congress. On the loth and 
16th of February, he spoke in opposition to the Force hill. 
and in support of his resolutions. Mr. Everett observes 
that " on this occasion the doctrine of nullification was 
supported with far greater ability than it had been by 
Colonel Hayne." Mr. Webster replied to Mr. Calhoun 
on the 16th and 17th, in a speech, which for close, com- 
pact reasoning, lucid arrangement, and the clear, broad 
path of light which runs through it from beginning to 
end, exceeds all other speeches which it has ever hi 'en 
my good fortune to examine. The great argument of 
Demosthenes upon the Crown approaches the near 
to it. 

I lis speech in reply to Colonel Hayne is more exhila- 
rating. It embraces a greater variety of topics. It is 
evident, from the beginning to the (aid o\' that reply, 
that he treated Colonel Bayne as a kind-hearted giant 
would play with a child. He would lift him up and 
ease him down gently and good naturedly. 
I 



27 

It was with a different feeling that he replied to Mr. 
Calhoun. He felt that he had a labor before him. The 
reasoning of the great nullifier is as close as is that of Mr. 
Webster. Admit the proposition that he starts with and 
you admit the whole doctrine of nullification. The pro- 
position was, that the Constitution is a compact between 
the Staffs. If so, then the States must necessarily be 
the judges of what is a violation of the compact. Mr. 
Webster denied the proposition and disproved it by al- 
most every line and letter of the Constitution itself. 
Whatever calamities may waylay and beset our future 
path, we may rest assured that no future statesman will 
have the hardihood to call up even the ghost of nullifi- 
cation. 

This last speech from Mr. Webster drew a highly 
complimentary letter from the venerable James Madison, 
one of the framers of the Constitution, in which he coin- 
eides with all the views he had presented. 

The bill introduced into the House of Representatives 
to provide for the collection of the revenue, by using 
force should it be necessary, met with opposition. Mr. 
Everett informs us " that the aid of Mr. Webster was 
personally solicited in the great debate by a member of 
the Cabinet, but it was not granted until the bill had 
undergone important amendments suggested by him, 
when it was given cordially, without stint and without 
condition." 

Without descending to further particulars, I will re- 
mark, that throughout this period of the severest trial of 
the strength of our Constitution and government, Gene- 
ral Jackson depended not upon his Cabinet, nor upon 
any of the leading men of his own political faith, but 
upon Daniel Webster. 



28 

I now approach another great event in the life of Mr. 
Webster ; an event which fully shows that he was not 
merely the most eloquent living orator, but the most 
far-seeing and energetic diplomatist of the age in which 
he lived, if not of all preceding ages. It evinces also. 
and most fully evinces, that, although he had political 
opinions and political friends that he held in high es- 
teem, he also had a heart for his country, and that for 
that country he would sacrifice all minor ties. He made 
the sacrifice promptly and unhesitatingly ; and it is cer- 
tain, very certain, that but for him and him alone, un- 
aided and unassisted, this country would have been in- 
volved in a long and bloody war with Great Britain, or 
in commercial distresses and border forays, aim* de- 

structive as war itself. I refer, I need not say, to the 
AMiburton treaty. 

The causes which, but for him. would have led to a 
rupture with Great Britain, were numerous and threat- 
ening. The British government, in order to put an end 
to the trade in human flesh, had. at different times, en- 
tered into compacts with several of the different govern- 
ments of Europe, authorising a mutual right of search 
by the armed cruisers of each. This right, the govern- 
ment of the United States had refused to acknowledge. 
In 18-41 it was conceded by France, by Russia, and by 
Austria and Prussia ; but owing in a great degree i<» the 
arguments of Mr. Webster, the treaty was finalh an- 
nulled and its entire doctrine repudiated. The British 
government gave up the right of search, but for a con- 
siderable time contended for the right to visit vessels 
suspected of being concerned in the African slave trade. 
Mr. Webster demonstrated so clearly that the right to 
visit necessarily embraced the right to search, thai this 



6 



29 

claim was also abandoned. His ground was that the 
American flag should protect itself, and the leading jour- 
nals of Europe acknowledged that a death blow had been 
given to the whole English doctrine of impressment, of 
search and of visit. 

It must be remembered that when Mr. Webster came 
into the Cabinet of President Harrison, the prospect of a 
war was threatening ; and that Mr. Stevenson, our Min- 
ister in London, felt it to be his duty to open a corres- 
pondence with the commander of the American squad- 
ron in the Mediterranean. 

Notwithstanding the death-blow which had been giv- 
en to the doctrine of impressment, there remained two 
other subjects of dispute — the trial of McLeod for the 
destruction of the American steamboat Caroline in our 
waters, and the long standing controversy in relation to 
our northern boundarv line. McLeod, however, was 
acquitted by a New- York jury, on the ground that lie 
was a British soldier, and had acted under the orders 
of his commanding officer, and that those orders had 
been confirmed by the British government, 

The preeminence of the mind of Mr. Webster over the 
minds of all the greatest statesmen of the age in which 
he lived, was fully exhibited in the management of the 
exciting controversv in relation to our northern line. 
That controversy had been the subject of negotiation for 
fifty-eight years. It had employed the best talents of the 
statesmen of both countries for a large portion of that 
period. The King of the Netherlands had been appoint- 
ed arbitrator by the two governments, and he made a 
report which dissatisfied both parties. General Jackson 
undertook the settlement of the complicated dispute 
with the successive aid of Mr. Van Buren, Mr. Livings- 



30 

ton, Mr. McLean and Mr. Forsyth. In every message from 
the beginning to the end of both his administrations, one 
prominent feature was the failure of all attemps to settle 
this long standing controversy. Mr. Van Buren, during 
the four years of his administration, did all that he could 
do. He made and he received propositions. But what sat- 
isfied one party dissatisfied the other, and at the close of 
his administration the aspect of affairs was more threaten- 
ing than at any former period. In the meantime, out- 
breaks had taken place on the border land, which seri- 
ously threatened the peace of the two nations. In 1839, 
the State of Maine placed in the hands of the Governor 
eight hundred thousand dollars for military purposes, 
and raised a little army to defend the line to which she 
claimed. It was observed that thus far everything had 
awaited " the sluggish flow of the current of diplomacy." 
It had also been proposed to leave the whole dispute to 
three Kings, authorizing them to invoke the aid of three 
scientific men. 

Soon after Mr. Webster was appointed Secretary of 
State, he proposed to tin; British Minister to establish a 
conventional line. This proposition was made known 
to Sir Robert Peel, who at once advised its acceptance 
without delay. Lord Ashburton was named as the per- 
son best qualified to conduct the negotiation, lie at 
first declined it. but upon reflecting upon the subject, he 
was induced to accept it. He said his scruples were 
removed in ;i great degree by the exalted opinion he had 
formed of Mr. Webster when in England. He came to 
tliis country. The proposition of Mr. Webster was 

submitted to him and ace. pled, lie also proposed that 
all parties having any interest in the question in dis- 
pute should have a voice in determining the line. He 



31 

therefore invited Maine and Massachusetts to send Com- 
missioners to Washington. A special session of the legis- 
lature of Maine Mas called, and four Commissioners select- 
ed from her wisest and ablest men were sent to Washing- 
ton. In other words, the parties alone interested in the 
controversy were brought together. England, the United 
States, Massachusetts and Maine, settled the whole con- 
troversy in about as many hours as it would take two 
neighboring farmers disposed to live amicably together, 
to settle a line involving a few rods of land on one side 
or the other. This treaty was submitted to the Senate 
of the United States, and confirmed by an almost unani- 
mous vote. Thus terminated a controversy of fifty-eight 
years duration, which carried us at times to the very 
verge of war with a nation, with which it was our high- 
est interest to remain at peace. 

I believe that I may safely say that no instance can 
be found in modern diplomacy, of the settlement of a 
national question involving important national interests. 
with so much dispatch, so little expense, and in a man- 
ner so entirely satisfactory to men in all parts of the 
country, and of all political opinions. 

You may well imagine that, as Mr. Webster's mind 
first suggested this simple and obviously only mode of 
bringing this controversy to a peaceful termination, much 
of the labor must also have devolved upon him. This 
was probably the fact. But all labor was light to him 
in the service of his country. He brought to that great 
effort the heart of a Patriot and the capacious mind of a 
lofty Statesman. He saw that upon his untiring efforts 
depended the onward march of a great and a free peo- 
ple, and lie never faltered in his course until the splendid 
work was fully accomplished. While we lament his 



32 

death, we rejoice that he was born upon American soil, 
that lie toiled not for himself, but for American freedom 
and American renown, and that he has left behind him 
a body of American law and American literature which 
will be coeval with the language of his native land. 

My friends there is a decree of intellectual greatness 
beyond the reach of eulogy : there is a universality of 
admiration more eloquent than language ; there is a 
sublimity of moral grandeur, which neither the poet, 
the historian, nor the orator can adequately portray. 
Who now thinks of conveying to another mind a full 
picture of the lofty narrative of Thucydides, the soul- 
stirring and life-like scenes of Shakspeare, the severe 
logic and terrific denunciations of Demosthenes, or the 
moral grandeur and enduring patriotism of Washington I 
Language alone is inadequate to the full performance of 
such a task. 

It is a truth universally acknowledged by men of all 
religious persuasions and all political faiths, that by the 
death of Mr. Webster, we have lost not only a great 
man. but a sincere patriot, lie had a great head and a 
areat heart. There was no stinted measure about him. 
He seemed in all respects to have been made for the 
period in which lie lived. He seemed to have been de- 
signed and set apart for the performance of labors which 
no other man, in our day. could so well perform. All 
the Herculean task of sustaining our inimitable Consti- 
tution against the attack- " el' sophists, calculators 
and economists" rested, as did the heavens upon Atlas. 

upon the shouldm- of Daniel Webster. 

Asa genera] truth, whenever a question arose, not 
connected with party politics, which in any wise involv- 
ed the constitutional powers of the general government, 



33 

Mr. Webster was appealed to for light, which could be 
provided by no other mind. 

But it was not upon great occasions alone that his 
great powers were manifested. It was not the loftiness 
of the subject that conferred such a power and dignity 
of mind. On the contrary, every subject seemed to de- 
rive additional dignity from the ease, the simplicity, and 
the naturalness with which he discussed it. Whether 
it was the interpretation of the Constitution in the Sen- 
ate, or the cheerful conversation of the fire-side, he was 
generally more instructive and interesting than most 
other men. His humor was of the same family as his 
logic. The playfulness of his mind was as fascinating 
as its loftier and more intense workings were majestic 
and commanding. He was a sort of intellectual Achilles, 
and would often demolish the argument of his Hector 
in a single circuit around its bulwarks. He would often 
comprehend all the vital parts of a complicated case in a 
single proposition. 

Place him wherever we might, his mind seemed at 
once to adjust itself to the occasion. Its power of con- 
traction or enlargement seemed to me above that of any 
other man I ever met with. I have been with him more 
than once, when the Colossus who approached nearer to 
him than any other of the great men I have seen him with, 
was present. By this you will understand that I refer 
to Mr. Calhoun. I have been with him when lawyers 
and orators, book makers and book readers, and now 
and then a man of science were present. I have also 
been alone with him on the banks of the trout brook 
and on the rocks of the ocean coast, and I do not re- 
member that I ever parted with him without an increas- 
ed admiration of his mind. He not only brought more 



34 

than his share of wisdom and learning to every intellec- 
tual banquet, but more also of humor. His very presence 
elevated our conception of the dignity of man ; 

" A combination and a form indeed, 
Where every God did seem to set his seal. 
To give the world assurance of a man.'' 

At times he has also transported my mind to a be- 
lief in the entire truth of the beautiful remark of Boling- 
broke : " Socrates entered a prison with the same coun- 
tenance with which he subdued the thirty tyrants. He 
took from off the place its ignominy. For how could it 
be a prison while Socrates was there I" 

But, my friends, it was not my object to present to 
your minds the whole of the mental character, or many 
even of the valuable public services of Daniel Webster, 
but to confine myself mainly to his lofty, uniform and 
untiring efforts to impress upon the public mind the 
great truth, that our prosperity, our peace, and all that 
is valuable in life, depend upon the preservation of the 
Constitution. To this great work he devoted nearly his 
whole life. To this he sacrificed pleasure, fortune and 
all party attachments. Wherever and whenever an at- 
tack was made upon the Constitution by friend or foe, 
Daniel Webster was seen upon its outward wall, pro- 
claiming in words of living light : 

" While the Union last<. we have high, exciting, grati- 
fying prosperN spread out before us. for as and for our 
children. Beyond that. I seek not to penetrate the veil. 
God grant in mv day, at least that curtain may never 
rise ! God grant that on my vision never may be open- 
ed what lies behind ! When m\ eyes shall be turned to 
behold for the last time the sun in heaven, may \ not 
him shining on the broken and dishonored fragments 



35 

of a once glorious Union ; on States dissevered, discord- 
ant) belligerent; on a land rent with civil feuds, or drench- 
ed, it may be, in fraternal blood. Let their last feeble 
and lingering glance rather behold the gorgeous ensign 
of the Republic, now known and honored throughout 
the earth, still full high advanced, its arms and trophies 
streaming in their' original lustre, not a stripe erased or 
polluted, nor a single star obscured, bearing for its motto, 
no such miserable interrogatory as What is all this worth $ 
nor those other words of delusion and folly, Liberty 
first and Union after wards ; but everywhere spread all 
over in characters of living light, blazing on its ample 
folds, as they float over the sea and over the land, and 
in every wind under the whole heavens, that other sen- 
timent, dear to every true American heart, ' Liberty and 
Union, now and forever, one and inseparable.' " 

This is but one of the outpourings of that mighty heart, 
every throb of which was for his country. His first and 
strongest desire was the permanent union of these States 
for the sake of the States. His next, that, influenced 
by our example, all the civilized nations of Europe, 
might in time come within our principles and adopt our 
institutions. He embraced the freedom of the world 
in his broad and capacious mind. He must have seen 
that the time for so great a change, if not at hand, is not 
far removed in the future. Although God, for some 
wise purpose to us unknown, has inseparably connected 
moral good and moral evil in all the great elements of 
nature, yet we also know that in the progress of human 
society, the good has been gradually gaining upon the 
evil. 

Both the Greek and the Roman were military repub- 
lics. They began the great work of human civilization, 



36 

but they began with inadequate means and they failed. 
The countries over which they ruled, were conquered by 
countless hordes of barbarians, and darkness for a time 
seemed to reign over the entire globe. Yet amid this 
darkness a ray of light remained. Hordes of Scandina- 
vian pirates overran and inhabited the British Isles. 
That ray of light expanded itself into Magna Charta. and 
Magna Charta, under the influence of the Saxon spirit, 
expanded itself with a broader and purer effulgence, into 
the American Constitution. Through all these great 
changes, the great principles of human freedom were 
gaining strength, slowly and gradually, but gaining. 
Amid the ocean of blood that has been spilled in mod- 
ern Europe, it is still certain that she has advanced in 
civilization for the last two centuries. The tyrant's rod 
has often been wielded by the Saxon arm of England, 
and poverty has been confined to its destitution by op- 
pressive and arbitrary laws. The English poor of the 
present day are continued poor by the unequal distribu- 
tion of property in former days, and by too large a popu- 
lation for so small a space. God in his wisdom has pro- 
vided a remedy for this evil, a remedy which human wis- 
dom did not even dream often years ago. The means of 
emigration to this country have increased ten fold within 
that period. Within that period also, gold has been dis- 
covered in California and Australia. California is nearly 
ten times as large as the three British Islands. Australia 
contains more square miles than the whole continent of 
Europe. Steam i> transporting thousands upon thou- 
sands, probably nearly half a million a year, to this coun- 
try and to Australia. The rich, the well educated, and 
the pauper, work side by side upon the same farm and 
in the same mine. English newspapers and English 



37 

Reviews already begin to complain that the labor of their 
country will soon be insufficient to supply the necessary 
demand. The price of labor will therefore rise, and rise 
with a rapidity never before known. The balance of 
social wants and dependencies is changing, and changing 
rapidly. The poor will not much longer depend upon 
the rich for employment, but the rich will depend upon 
the poor for labor. Would it be among the wildest 
dreams of the imagination, should we say that the time 
is not far distant when we shall pay the debt we owe to 
England for the Saxon blood she gave us, by favoring 
her with a copy of the American Constitution? 

It is not given us to know the future. "We can form 
some judgment, however, of coming events from the con- 
stantly increasing and enlarging agencies of the two great 
instruments of human intelligence and human freedom, 
— the spirit of commerce and the spirit of the press. 

It has been said, or imagined, that lofty mountains of 
hard and solid rock have been worn down to the level 
of the earth by the corrosion of the atmosphere. But 
commerce and the press together will make much shorter 
work with Austria, Russia and Prussia. Nothing but 
a wall of tire as broad and as high as the Andes can 
protect them from the influence of these great levelling 
agencies. Such agencies have never before existed. 
Their sphere of action is every day enlarging. Like 
the great elements of nature, they produce much of evil, 
but much more of good. 

We have all of us, perhaps, indulged too much in 
bitter anathemas against English severities and encroach- 
ments upon the rights of the semi-barbarous races of Hin- 
dostan. But moral evil and moral good seem to go hand 
in hand in the great work of human civilization. We 



38 

have exterminated more than half the savage tribes of 
this country, and who regrets it. England has her hold 
upon Burmah and Siam, and in time she will pass through 
China to the Pacific. Her arms will be accompanied by 
her laws and her literature, and those great civilizers of 
modern days, commerce and the press. Before those 
who are just beginning life shall become old, our com- 
merce, our language and our laws will be planted on 
both sides of the great Pacific, and "Hail Columbia! 
happy land," will ascend in the voices of millions of 
freemen, for more than a thousand miles along the islands 
of Japan. 

Nothing can prevent this prevalence over the world 
of our institutions, but the entire failure of the great 
experiment in this extended country. — Therefore, said 
Mr. Webster, hold on to the Union. If we fail, the 
cause of free governments throughout the world will 
fail. Despotism will sharpen its sword and strengthen 
its arm, and superstition again unfurl her blood stained 
banner. Let us therefore hold on our course a little 
longer, a little longer. 

Daniel Webster our greatest statesman, the giant in- 
tellect of the age, has left us. But he has left his own 
great works behind him. We have also the works of 
other great minds, the railroad and the telegraph. These 
iron chains are binding these States closer and closer 
together. A knowledge of the comforts, the intelligence, 
and the power of a great and free people, is spreading 
wider and wider over the world. By the aid of steam 
it lias become a mere relaxation from toil, to cros-< the 1 
v\ ide Atlantic. American newspapers and American men. 
are daily addressing the European mind in European 
languages. The seed is planted. The planters are ^till 



39 



at work, -widening that field and enriching that soil. 
Hold on* a little longer, a little longer, to the work which 
employed his whole life, the success of which was the 
great hope of his broad and expansive heart. Hold on 
to the Constitution and the Union, now and forever. 



LB D 




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